Rick Berg’s wealth under scrutiny in North Dakota Senate race

Republican Rep. Rick Berg, running for Senate in North Dakota, has close ties to a controversial property management company that has been the target of dozens of tenant complaints, been cited for alleged fire safety violations and received a less than stellar grade from the Better Business Bureau.

Berg, one of the wealthiest members of Congress, personally owns apartment buildings run by Goldmark Property Management Inc., one of North Dakota’s largest landlords. Employees of the firm and related companies, including business associates Berg has known for decades, have donated tens of thousands of dollars to Berg and GOP committees to back his runs for federal office.

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Yet Berg does not, as alleged by Democrat Heidi Heitkamp, have any formal legal ties to or control over Goldmark Property Management. And even some Democrats have winced at her attempts to link the company’s actions to proposals to change Social Security and other entitlement programs.

Berg’s finances have become a hot issue in a surprisingly tight race that could determine control of the Senate. With the battle for the Senate majority down to a handful of races, the two candidates and outside groups have poured millions of dollars into TV ads in a state that hasn’t seen a competitive Senate race in more than 25 years.

Berg’s business dealings have drawn harsh criticism from Democrats, who are trying to turn one of his strongest selling points into a political liability. These Democratic attacks have drawn a vigorous defense from the Berg campaign and national Republicans, who had hoped North Dakota would be a slam-dunk as a GOP Senate seat pickup.

The picture of Berg’s finances — put together by POLITICO through public documents from North Dakota — reveal a complex combination of ownership structures. Berg’s ties to the executives who run the Goldmark-related companies are extensive.

For example, Goldmark Schlossman Commercial Real Estate Services — a related firm that Berg helped found in the mid-1990s — is located at the same address in Fargo and shares the same phone number as Goldmark Property Management, and leases space from it as well.

And during a 26-year career in the North Dakota Legislature, including holding several GOP leadership posts, Berg backed legislation that would buttress landlords’ legal and financial positions, according to legislative records from that period.

Berg has angrily countered questions about his business dealings by accusing Heitkamp, a former state attorney general, of hitting “a new low in North Dakota politics” by falsely claiming he “owns” Goldmark Property Management, a company “in which he holds no employment, management, ownership, shareholding, or invested interest — nor has he ever.”

However, the true picture of Berg’s ties to the firm is more complex than both candidates have let on.

Berg’s version of events — a college whiz kid turned successful businessman and state legislator — is a key facet of his success story.

Berg first began working with three associates — Dale Lian, James Wieland and Kenneth Regan, all Goldmark Property Management officers — in 1982, when the quartet created Midwest Management Corp., state records show.

“In his senior year of college, Rick partnered with a few friends to start a small real estate business in Fargo,” Berg says in his official biography. “With nothing more than a loan, a vision, and a lot of hard work, what began as a business idea among friends grew into what is now Goldmark Schlossman Commercial Real Estate Services."

Relax mlwm , some of us are capitalist wealthy leftist. Jealousy is something related to insecurity or immaturity so don't give yourself away. Fraud or corruption don't have to be exclusive to wealthy people nor to political party people. If they are representatives of all people then they have to disclose everything. If you can't take the heat in the kitchen..get out.

It doesn't matter what the Better Business Bureau says after all it is just a communist organization. According to the Repubs any type of regulation or fraud is just evil. There should be no accountability by the business owner. Too bad if the fire alarms don't work and you die in a fire. It is buyer beware. Too bad there was poison in the food you ate oh well buyer beware, too bad the brakes didn't work on the airplane after all maintenance costs money, buyer beware.

And yet not one genius liberals could care less that Valerie Jarrett was the queen of Chicago slum lords that had close ties to convicted felon and ex neighbor of the Kenyan Klown Tony Rezco. Of course not.

Gee, another rich Republican slum lord. What could possibly be wrong with that? Good business is good profits, regardless of who suffers, right?

Check out the complete Romney video on MotherJones. com where Romney also mentions visiting a Chinese factory Bain Capital bought that was run by al all-woman force in slave labor conditions where even Romney described the workers living 12 to a room in bunkbeds making as he says a "pittance" salary. Romney was instead impressed that the factory had a high barbed wire fence not to keep workers in but to keep needy workers out.

Instead of creating jobs in America, venture capitalists like Romney create jobs in China at such low wages that no American company can compete while making millionaires off the abuse of others whether it is as a slumlord or slumlord/employer. Notice that Romney who failed as a former Mormon missionary, in Paris, France, no less, and failed to bring a single person to Christ, but apparently found another god on Wall St. better suited to his character. Think he will become a god of his own planet? Think God will be impressed by his financial portfolio or Mormon magic underwear?

Haven't people had enough of the moral sludge that runs for office in America ? Berg is just another Godless Ayn Rand disciple. Too bad the corporate media is afraid to play Romney's taped remarks about keeping 22 year old Chinese women locked inside his Chinese Bain factory with barb wire.

The third paragraph states: "Yet Berg does not, as alleged by Democrat Heidi Heitkamp, have any formal legal ties to or control over Goldmark Property Management."

Yet, in the second paragraph, the writer says: "Berg, one of the wealthiest members of Congress, personally owns apartment buildings run by Goldmark Property Management Inc., one of North Dakota’s largest landlords."

How does one not have any legal connections with Goldmark Property Management when buildings that (as the article states) are "personally owned" by Representative Berg are operated by Goldmark Property Management. There must be a legal contract outlining how Goldmark should operate the building for Berg and the fees that Berg, in turn, would pay Goldmark for the operation of the buildings. If there is no agreement, then Goldmark is providing free services to Berg (a member of Congress) without receiving compensation then that could be in violation of House Ethics Rules or even Statutes regarding bribery or influence peddling.

If the latter is the case, then some form of investigation is required to make sure that Berg is breaking no laws.